


The Best of Us

by BlueColoredDreams



Series: Hard to Starboard [2]
Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Depression, Implied Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Multi, Polyamory, References to suicidal ideation, spoilers for ep.66
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-30
Updated: 2017-06-30
Packaged: 2018-11-21 12:00:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,319
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11357070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlueColoredDreams/pseuds/BlueColoredDreams
Summary: I have seen the best of us go down and not come up.





	The Best of Us

**Author's Note:**

> SO how 'bout that episode holeeeeeeee shit  
> You don't have to read Peachy to read this, but it's taking place in that same little bubble of canon-compliant canon-divergence and references it. ALSO: Let's pretend I didn't bang this out in like, a couple of hours after I listened to the episode yesterday and only did a bare minimum of editing.  
> Title/summary from Best of Us Go Down by Aquilo.

The last conversation she ever has with Lup goes like this:

Lucretia can’t sleep. She sees Lup behind her eyelids, shoulders tight and straight and her mouth forming the words _Cordelia_ and _the Gauntlet_ , lips twisting and bitter and her fingers bitten down to the quick as she grips her arms, but they all know that she’s barely keeping it together, and they’d all drifted apart like they always do when these reports are given, like leaves on the wind, and they went  wordlessly to their rooms. Lucretia sat in silence on the floor of her room, watching Fisher drift in its tank for hours before she’d even tried to sleep. She gives up on sleeping fairly soon after, unable to settle, unable to get Lup’s terrible, blank expression out of her mind, unable to find any sense of comfort.

She creeps out of her quarters; her neck and shoulders are in knots from tossing and turning. She makes herself tea with splash of whiskey and wanders through the halls to stretch her legs and get some air.

She didn’t consciously seek Lup out, or even intend to run into Lup on the deck, but it’s habit to go up to check to see if she’s there, and decades of habits are hard to break. She emerges into the night, gaze landing directly on her.

Lup stands at the prow, in _their_ spot, the same place Lucretia has always gone to think, to hold her place during their escapes, where she desperately begged Lup not to die. Where, in the years since, they have met informally and formally, sometimes to get smashed, sometimes to just be together and quiet.

It’s been quiet a lot recently between them.

Lup’s hands are braced against the railings, her head bowed and hair flying in the slight wind the atmospheric barrier allows through.

It’s dark and wild and Lup’s silhouette is solemn and tall and it’s so, so sad. Lucretia aches to see it, in the very pit of her chest and in the roots of her teeth and in the backs of her eyes.

She cups her mug between her fingers, teeth worrying her lip. She doesn’t hold it against Lup at all, but sometimes it’s hard to look her in the eye. It’s hard to look any of them in the eye these days.

Lucretia knows it’s strained because Lup and Barry feel awkward about being pitted against her.  But she’s not upset with them.  

She stopped being upset the second Lup swore to her, on both lives. Between them, that’s a big promise, it means something to them both, to them all. Lup’s life means everything, and so Lucretia set it aside. Does it hurt? Is she disappointed? Does it agonize her like it agonizes the others? Yes, yes, yes. She feels like there’s a vice in her throat, a stake in her heart, food tastes like ash and she shakes when she looks down at the world below, but she stops herself there. She makes herself stop. They took a vote, and it was fair. She loves them all far too much to waste her time being bitter, to waste her time obsessing over something that was over and done with.

It’s just… hard. Hard to see it all crumble like that, hard to see Lup falter, hard to see Barry fumble and stumble around conversations with her. It’s easier to leave them both alone, to remove herself from the equation while they’re trying to balance themselves with what they did.

It’s hard to look at Lup, hard to see her like this, alone on the deck and quiet, shoulders spread as she watches the world below slide by.  

Lucretia watches Lup’s dark hair shift in the night, the dark waves seizing her throat and heart—Lup failed to dye it as it grew; she’s never had to bother with it, before, not really, not when it’s magic and holds ten times as long as conventional dye would, and not when it goes back to its electric bubblegum state when they went back to their recorded states. But she ignored it when they hit the year mark, and her wild mane of pink and blonde ombre curls has faded to orange and dark roots and frizzy ends.

 _"Who fucking cares?"_ she snapped when Taako fussed at her about her roots and her frizzy ends, and it had felt like a punch in the gut, the final straw, the last piece that pushed Lucretia over the edge. The final thing that made her stop hesitating and start planning.

It had burst in her chest, the bubble of discomfort in her heart, breaking and flooding her and she’s going to have to do it again: She’s going to have to be alone again, and it’s a cold moment of shocking realization, the understanding blooming behind her eyes like fireworks.

It’s always Lup that pushes her over the precipice of thought and action, and it’s the most bittersweet thing and it scares her, it terrifies her, more than seeing them on the dusty gray earth, more than seeing Lup step of the edge of the deck, more than holding Lup’s shaking hand as they watch Barry’s image bloom out from his broken body in the drake den, more than standing alone and having her plan peeled away from her in quiet acquiescence. The words _, ‘who cares’_ from Lup’s lips and the realization that she is going to have to be alone scares her to her very essence.

Her fingers had slipped and trembled then  as she cut up potatoes for dinner, and the resultant gash across her palm ached for weeks after—Magnus had helped her bind it up, had salve and had tutted over her, but his eyes were distant and she can’t.

She can’t, can’t, can’t, _can’t_. She thought she could, but oh god she can’t. She knows Lup is broken, and it hurts.

They’re all broken. All of them, they’re so shattered and distant and listless, helpless shadows of who they used to be, and she aches and breaks for them. Something vital in their souls had been sucked out of them with the aftermath of the making of the Relics, with the horror of watching the wars unfold, of realizing the wholesale destruction they’d unleashed.

She has to do this to save them. But it makes it hard to look them in the eye, when she’s planning to betray them all—it’s not a betrayal, not really, she tries to convince herself it’s not, but it _is._ She’s still having problems talking herself into it, still sits at her desk with her hand hovering for hours and hours, not recording a single word. She can’t yet, but she knows she needs to.

Lup’s shoulders are outlined in silver light and they shudder. Lup crumbles in against the deck, her fists balled up on the top of the chrome railings as she slumps, shoulders heaving in the night.

She makes no sound, but Lucretia can hear her, she can hear her in her chest and in her mind and Lup cries, she wails, she sobs and screams and begs in Lucretia’s heart.

It’s hard to look Lup in the eye, but this is harder.

She pads forward on the deck, putting a soft hand on Lup’s back. “Lup,” she whispers.

She keeps her hand flat on Lup’s shaking shoulders, leaning down to set her mug at their feet. She then draws Lup to her, tucking her to her chest.

It’s a futile effort, but she asks, “What’s wrong, Lup?” She asks, even though she knows the answer, because she would want to be asked, if she were Lup, she would want the opening, the chance to be candid. This is what Lup always offers her, so she does the same.

Lup is a mess as she pushes away, her face blotchy and face twisted into a snarl of embarrassed rage, “What do you mean, _what’s wrong_ , Lucretia? What do you _think_ is wrong, or are you so wrapped up in being right that you can’t tell?”

Lucretia closes her eyes slowly; she will not allow Lup’s words to hurt her—it’s what Lup wants. She is not Taako, she is not Barry.

She is someone that Lup can hurt, and will. She exhales slowly, trying to calm her quaking insides. Lup knows where she is vulnerable, knows her and, hopefully, still cares for her, but Lucretia is not someone who is above being collateral damage when Lup self-destructs, and so Lucretia must keep herself safe. She opens her eyes and surveys Lup’s tear-stained face.

“Do you want to talk?” she asks gently.

She doesn’t know if Lup has talked about it, if she’s mentioned it to Taako or spoken with Barry, but the spark in her eyes is gone and Lucretia cannot stand it.

Lup, extinguished. This is a future Lucretia would have never imagined; she never thought she would see those eyes so empty and ragged, see Lup’s freckles faded from lack of sun, her skin dull, and the bags under her eyes belying many nights spent awake, alone.

Lup  looks away from Lucretia and turns her eyes back down to the world below. They’re too high up to see individuals, but there are lights of towns and cities and fires burning below, signals billowing up in the night—whether they’re signs of war or famine or nature gone awry, there’s no way to know. Lucretia doesn’t want to know anymore, and she knows Lup does not either, but maybe Lup _should_ —maybe the flickering below is the result of drought and lightening, but unless Lup finds out, she’ll assume it was her gauntlet again, for the second time that day.

“Over a thousand people,” she whispers in agony. “A thousand _more_ people, and that’s just—it’s just a scratch on the surface, isn’t it Luce?”

“Just wait it out,” Lucretia breathes. “Just wait it out.”

Lup’s hands find her face, fingers pressed against her jaw and thumbs on her cheek. Lucretia closes her eyes again, and Lup brushes over her eyelids, and for a second, Lucretia just wants her to press her thumbs to her sockets and gouge them out, just so she doesn’t have to see them all so broken.

Blind her, maim her, flay her alive, if that’s what would make them happy, if that’s what would make them whole, if that’s what would make them forget they had two options and this is what they _chose._

Because they can’t forget they chose this, they willingly went with it, they chose this destruction and they cannot live with it, and Lucretia wishes she’d never opened her damn mouth in that meeting. Because it makes it all just so much _worse._

If she hadn’t spoken up, would Lup be in any better shape? Would _any_ of them be? Would she be this desperate, would they be this hurt? Would they be down there, in the thick of it, _living_?

“I can’t wait anymore, Lucy,” Lup sobs. “I can’t do it.”

Lucretia clutches Lup’s arms and crashes their lips together, tasting salt and blood and Lup. She cups her hand tightly against her jaw, and there are teeth and there’s snot and there is hot tea over her bare feet, but she crowds Lup against the railing, gripping her, holding her tightly.

 _Please live_ , she begs them all, each day, under her breath. It’s a song she sings alone, it’s the words she writes at night, the portraits she paints at noon, it’s the hands on shoulders and mugs of coffee and each tear she sheds in the dead of night.

_Please live, please._

She did this so they can live, so they can love and be joyful, so they can have a home and a future. She went along with this so they could _live_ and not just survive, but this isn’t living, this isn’t even surviving—this is waiting in horror and dread and this right here, it’s death. This is death, this is them dying.

Lup is dying, Lup is dying like this, it’s killing her and it’s killing Lucretia too. She loves them so much, and that love is suffocating her with her helplessness.

Lup’s hands climb into her hair and Lucretia drops one hand to grip the small of her back, crushing Lup to her with all her strength.

“Please, just, just wait it out for me,” Lucretia pleads. “Wait it out for me. You were right, Lup, you were _right_. The Hunger hasn’t found us, you and Barry were _right,_ ” she says fiercely.

“If there’s not a world to save when we starve the Hunger, was it worth it, Lucretia?” Lup says and Lucretia holds her tighter, her forehead pressed to Lup’s, Lup’s skin hot and feverish against her own.

“There’s us. There’s you and Barry and you and Taako and Merle and Magnus and Davenport, and- and, and it’s worth it,” Lucretia says, fingers tightening into Lup’s top. “It has to be, it _has_ to be, because it was your idea and you’re the best of us.”

“That’s you, Lucy, that’s you,” Lup says back and Lucretia wants to cry from it because Lup curls her fingers behind her head and kisses her again. “ _You_ were the best of us. You were the only one who kept the promise, Luce, you were the best of us then.”

Lucretia cradles her close, arches her spine and leans onto her toes to push herself over Lup, and Lup leans up against the railing, her knees loose and her body dropped and Lucretia keeps her close, keeps her aligned to her center.

“You wanted to prevent this, Lucy, how did you know, how did you _know_ it would be this bad?” Lup asks against her mouth and Lucretia covers her words with her lips, with her tongue, with both hands cupped on Lup’s jaw, lifting her up in to each kiss.

She loves her, she loves her, she loves them all – and her plan, _god_ it’s terrible, it’s awful and it’s so lonely, but it could work, it _has_ to work and if it works, she can see Lup smile again, spend evenings lounging in her arms as Lup uses Barry as a pillow, the three of them, like it’s been. She can add herself back into their arms, into their hearts, into the messy chemical reaction that was their love—oh, how she misses them, how she misses Lup’s love and Barry’s clumsy companionship.

Lup was right, Lup was right: She was not a prize or a competition and neither were their plans. They had the same goal, they had the same dream—a world with no more death, no more Hunger, somewhere safe where they could be happy and rest and be free. There is no competing, there is nothing in her that resents Lup and Barry for what happened. She lost a fair fight, and what’s done is done.

But what is to come, well, that’s a bit different.

She could have never predicted the insurmountable damage the Relics would cause. It was just that she remembered the Light, remembered burned out shells of people who had wasted away before it. The image of the husks of the mushroom revenants have never left her dreams, stuck in a loop of worshiping the Light until they died—she has been afraid of it ever since.

It wasn’t that she knew what would happen, it was just that she knew the bone deep ache of wanting something so bad she would do anything for it. She knows the damage desire can do without an outlet, bears the scars herself that her own longing had placed on her, so she had guessed.

 “I didn’t, no one did,” Lucretia says gently. She strokes Lup’s face with her thumbs, slow circles under puffy eyes and slick skin.

“I wanted to prevent all this,” Lup murmurs, closing her eyes. “I wanted to stop this. I wanted to save us.”

“I know you did,” Lucretia assures her. “I know you did. You and Barry, all you wanted was to keep everyone safe and whole; I understand.”

“What would it be like, what would we be doing if we put up your shield, Lucy?” Lup asks.

“Oh, Lup, no,” Lucretia begs her. “No, no, no, honey, _no_.”

She does not want to go down this road. She will not. She will not. She decided the very second she had no hope of a draw or majority that she would set it aside.

“Tell me,” Lup insists, voice shaking. “Tell me it would be better than this, give me _something_ to want.”

“Lup, let me take you to Barry,” Lucretia says. “Let’s go wake up Barry, and, and we can sit and—tea or, I can help you make hot chocolate—Barry can help, or I can wake Taako for you, Lup, do you want me to grab Taako?”

“I’ve already talked to him and Taako,” Lup whispers. She cups Lucretia’s face in her palms, then sweeps her thumb forward, smoothing Lucretia’s hair back from her forehead. “It didn’t help, Lucy, please. Tell me there’s gotta be something to look forward to after all this shit. Don’t reason with me, don’t make me try to justify all those people who are just—they’re just _gone,_ Lucretia. It’s not a question of if they’re still in there, like when the Hunger absorbs the planes, they’re _gone_ and they’re _dead_ and we did it, indiscriminately—don’t try to,” she trails off, her eyes blank as she shudders and sobs.

Lucretia nods softly, tears wet on her cheeks.

“Give me something to believe in, to look forward to, something better than fifteen fucking dollars from Greg fucking Grimaldis.”

Lucretia presses their bodies together, hands flat against her as she keeps her close, holds her in place. There’s a fear burning in her gut, seeping through her veins and she was always the last stand, wasn’t she?

The last person, the one who held them all together, it was her then, and it will be her now, and she’s going to have to do it again. She has to be alone, because they cannot be with her and endure the pain. Lup sobs against her and Lucretia rubs her back the same way that Lup did for her all those cycles ago.

Her mind races. She grasps at the pieces and parts of it and slips on the edges of how big this is, but she has to pull it together for Lup now.

“We’d be together, still, just like this,” Lucretia promises.

She kisses Lup again, and it’s softer, needier, and deeper. Lup clings to her, and Lucretia holds her up.

“We’d still be together, maybe not all the time, but it would be us three, and Taako, and we’d go see the world, all of it down there, the things we just see at night and the things we see during the day, we’d see it all, just to choose what we wanted. We can linger, so we’ll explore and we’ll choose.”

Promises spill from her mouth like water, but she means them all. She wants to strap up her pack with Lup at her side, wants to hike the mountains and the forests with her and Barry, she wants to run and sleep under the stars with Lup in a world they can make their home.

Her broken, brilliant Lup. She would give it all to hear her laugh again, give it all to see her smile, see her hair bright and flamingly pink, her lips done up in wine-colored lipstick and quirked and she would do anything to get it back, anything for this plan of hers, this broken, twisted plan to work.  

She would do anything for Lup, who she’s loved for a century now, whose bed she first lay in seventeen years into their journey, only to never do it again until nearly twenty years ago, whose heart she never thought she’d cradle in her hands like she’s doing now, because Lup is Barry’s world and vice versa, but she shares their world now, ever since she begged Lup to stay alive, to stay with her, after Lup had sacrificed her life away to play with her new powers.

Her mouth had tasted like red wine the first time, then peaches, and now it’s the salt tang of blood and bitterness and age and guilt.

“We would go to the beach, visit Merle, you know how he loved the beach year—I did too, so I want to go to the beach, Lup,” she continues, and Lup’s hands slide down her back, tugging her closer, fingers lacing at the dip of her spine. “I would read and Barry would get sunburn, and you’d write on his back with sunscreen so his shoulders’ll say _hot stuff_ for weeks. And we’d drink a lot and we’d be hot and cranky—there would be sand _everywhere_ , you remember how we kept finding that shit for _ages_ after the beach year? Swear to Pan I still find it, even now.  Just like that, Lup. And you would be gorgeous as always and I would paint you every day, and you and Barry would find something to experiment on, and then we would travel to wherever you wanted.”

She hates that she’s thought this through already, hates that she has it planned. She hasn’t put the words to paper, but she’s thought about what she would need to do after, where she would hide them away so they could be happy without her.

“Snow,” Lup says, her eyes closing. “I’m sick of fire. I want to see some snow.”

“Okay, okay—we’d go to the snow, and I’d get chilblains and cry.”

“I have spells for that, you nerd,” Lup says.

Lucretia’s heart sings, because it’s almost a laugh, it’s almost a smile and she runs her nose against Lup’s, lips ghosting against her’s. “You wasted _all_ your spell slots on Barry,” she supplies, and there it is again, that huff and a twitch of her lips and Lucretia loves her, loves her, loves her so much.

“Okay, I believe that,” Lup murmurs, closing the distance between their mouths again. Her hands slip up Lucretia’s shirt and Lucretia’s shudder is bone deep and visceral, the touch like lightening as Lup’s nails graze her spine as their mouths surge together, forward and back.

When they pull away, Lup’s lips are swollen and slick and her cheeks are finally flushed with color. She inhales shakily, and asks, “What about the others?”

Lucretia twitches her fingers and a barrier comes up behind Lup as she pushes her up onto the railings, keeping her steady on the edge as Lucretia steps between her legs, a hand on her thigh and a hand on her face.

“We’d visit, of course,” Lucretia whispers. “Magnus’d probably become a carpenter, sell those ducks he’s fond of. Dav would go to that laboratory, he’s _so_ curious about what they’re doing. Barry’s probably gonna want to go too, so we’ll visit Dav and stay longer than we wanted, but Barry’d be so happy, yanno? We _will_ have it,” she adds, surprised at her own force. “I’m going to make sure we have it all.”

She skims her hands up Lup’s body, tracing the familiar curves and planes with gentle fingers as Lup hooks her legs around her hips. Lucretia presses them together, pressing her fingertips to Lup’s sternum to feel her heartbeat.

She drags her mouth away from Lup’s, burying her nose against the soft hollow behind Lup’s ear and kissing the flesh; she breathes in deep as she cups her fingers over Lup’s breasts, drawing a soft groan from her.

It’s such a base attempt at grounding Lup to life, it’s nothing compared to what keeps Lup around for her second lives, but she has to try because Lup is broken and she’s dying inside and it scares her. Lup’s asked her, asked her for this, and she’s going to give it. Lup asked her for something to hold onto, and Lucretia gives her her words, she gives her her body. She offers it all up, like Lup is a goddess to appease and worship and dedicate her entire self to.

She told Lup that she didn’t know what shape she would be in if she had to live alone again, but she knows she’ll make it somehow. She’ll be lonely and she’ll be sad and she’ll suffer, for sure, but her plan, the sad, sad, awful, terrible plan that’s been blossoming in her mind is the only way she can see the smile she fell in love with. It’s the only way they can escape the guilt long enough to live.

They didn’t do this to hide away on the ship; they did this to make themselves a _home_. They did this to keep the bonds they cherished, to keep the people on the world below safe from the Hunger; they did this to save and cherish and preserve.

Lup is warm under her hands, skin dry and hot and Lucretia aches for her—she and Magnus both have yet to hear anything of their Relics, and it’s so frightening, but Lucretia doesn’t know what she would be like if she had to be in Lup’s shoes, doesn’t know how she would deal with death upon death upon death for a plan that had been her own. She doesn’t know what state she’d be in if they’d raised her barrier and it _failed_ and the world starved in stasis.

She feels like she’s falling, reeling in space; Lup’s pressure against her unnerves her further, makes her shake and question and she’s—she’s so unused to needing to ground Lup. Lup normally centers _her_ , comforts her and leads her and pushes her forward. The ones who help Lup through it all have always been Taako and Barry, but if they’ve failed Lup, then what can Lucretia do? What can she do with her fumbling love and adoration and the guilt of giving them another option hanging over her head?

But when she draws away, Lup looks up at her with wide, wet eyes and an expression of unrestrained longing that Lucretia knows too well—she’s worn it herself, and Lup is looking to her to guide her. Lup is open, raw, exposed and offering what’s left of her up to Lucretia to keep safe.

“I’ve got you,” Lucretia whispers. “I’ve got you, Lup.”

She pulls away and she takes Lup with her, stepping through the cold tea puddle and down the stairs and into the faint blue light of her room—thank god Fisher is elsewhere, because she’s always felt weird about shooing them out of her room towards Magnus when Lup and Barry come to her—and she guides Lup to her bed, her hands gentle and her voice soft.

“I’ve got you,” she repeats, a promise, a prayer, a solution. She says it as she pulls her shirt off, as she pulls off Lup’s. She traces the words to Lup’s skin with her fingers and her mouth, whispering it against her breasts and her neck and her stomach, the inside of her knee, the flat of her palm.

“You didn’t mean it, you saved me, you know, all those years ago. You saved me, you saved Barry and Taako and all of us, you saved us,” she whispers. Her voice is a slur of sounds and cries and a quiet thread of consciousness that only Lup could understand. “I’m not angry, I wasn’t angry then, I just was hurt and startled and I want you to _live,_ please live for me, for Taako, for Barry, live Lup, Lup live—we can’t be like this forever, we’re gonna have to go down and live, and it’s gonna be okay. I know how to do it, just how to do it.”

Lup pulls her closer as they come together, and the tears drip down Lucretia’s face to Lup’s cheeks, and Lucretia knows she’s failing, knows she can’t convince Lup—because who _can_ talk her out of something? Not even Taako can talk her down sometimes, and this is just a formality, this is just Lup trying to let her know that she’s sorry, that she’s chosen something and Lucretia doesn’t know what, but she’s frightened and she clasps Lup’s hands to her face as they move, and she presses her face to her palms.

“I love you,” Lucretia says, “I love you, I’ve loved you, and I know you and Lup, I can make this okay. I’m gonna stop it all, I promise, you won’t hurt anymore—I’m gonna stop it, gonna _make_ it okay.”

And there it is, there’s Lup’s smile and the spark of her eyes, bright and lively and it does more for Lucretia than Lup’s hands or her hips or her mouth. Lup is smiling her crooked grin and Lucretia trembles and quivers and tightens up, breath hitching as she sobs and clutches at Lup even harder.

“ _We’re_ gonna make it okay,” Lup breathes, reverent. “I’ve got an idea, too, Lucy and I think this time we’re on the same page. Between us—we _can_ do it. We’re gonna go to the beach, Lucy, we’re gonna go see snow, and I’m gonna sell all your paintings and you’re gonna be famous. Bear’s gonna join that institute with Dav, and fuckall knows what Taako’s gonna do, but he’s gonna scam this world blind.”

Above her, Lucretia shudders and slumps forward, unable to form anything coherent, and Lup strokes across her body and she’s still smiling that quirked, sly grin that breaks Lucretia’s heart every time, and Lucretia falls asleep holding onto her and whispering, over and over, _I love you, we’re gonna make it right, together this time, I love you—_

She wakes up to the sound of shouting and breaking glass and feet in the hallway, and she sits up right as Barry slams her door open, eyes wide and wild and Lucretia panics, not because she’s stark naked, but because his face is whiter than bone and her bed is cold and the porthole of her room shows the night sky and she knows she’s lost time, and Barry is shaking her, his hands cold against her bare shoulders—

“Where is she, where’s Lup—”

“She’s gone, she’s _gone_ , Lucretia—”

She wraps herself up in her robe and runs past him, where everyone is in the galley, and there’s glass everywhere and the chairs are upside down and Taako looks like he’s hell bent on breaking everything, but Magnus holding him back and there’s a note on the table that everyone is staring at like it’s something that will rise up and strike them at any given time.

**_Back soon_. **

 

Lup doesn’t come back—Lucretia never knows if Lup really wanted to do the same thing, to gather up all the relics and put the shield up, but Lucretia doesn’t really care. She had her own plan, and she executes it and walks on her own path without her. Without all of them.

Lup does not come back.

Everyone else does in time, after ten lonely, tireless years. She’d been afraid she would lose her mind, but she keeps it together for them, but the first thing she does when Taako, Merle, and Magnus bring her that fucking gauntlet is shatter it into a million pieces once the Light is siphoned from it, right under her heel. She brings her foot down on the center of it and it shatters like it was made from glass.

It’s not much, but it feels like a small victory for her spitfire girl who has yet to make it home.


End file.
